Update!

It’s been awhile, so let’s do a little update, shall we?

My last post was somewhere around February 2025, but even before that, I’d been floundering for awhile. I started this blog in 2022 because I love writing and I’ve always wanted to have a blog. I began writing about theological issues in the church community that I had been a part of for quite some time as a way to get my thoughts out there and encourage others who might be feeling the same way. I had been working in campus ministry for a long time and felt compelled to write things for my students and those like them. I was also interested in building somewhat of a following online as the first step towards getting to write a book someday.

Shortly after I got my blog off the ground, I was blindsided by the betrayal and abandonment of folks who I worked with. They had told me that I could keep my job for as long as I wanted to keep it, but then eliminated my position because the other jobs that I was looking for hadn’t materialized and they thought I needed “urgency”. What I needed was support and a leg up, but that’s another conversation. I continued writing through this season and have written about it extensively on the blog. It just further emphasized what I was already questioning and railing against in conservative evangelicalism – a movement with which I hope never to be associated ever again. I say “movement” because it is not biblically or theologically tenable and, thus, has little to do with actual Christianity.  

My husband and I decided that the best thing for me to do would be to leave the town where we had made a home. So, we did. In the summer of 2023, we moved to a new town. We did not know anyone except one of my husband’s friends from college who was also moving to town as the priest of a church plant. We started going to that church and are still there, happily. My husband got a job teaching and I got a job that I was ridiculously over-qualified for, but I was so depressed that I didn’t know what else to do. Thankfully, my husband believes in me more than anyone else and he found a job that he thought I should apply for. I did and got that job at our local Food Bank where I got to use my skills to re-energize a volunteer and food drive program. It was great fun. From the summer of 2023 to the fall of 2024, I was just surviving. My daughter became increasingly difficult to parent and I felt aimless, with little purpose.

For most of my life, I’ve known that I was made to do ministry. I love welcoming outsiders and caring for folks that other Christians aren’t interested in tending to. I love teaching and helping others understand the Bible. I like making Christianity the accessible and life-changing faith that it is meant to be. While I was in campus ministry, I was best at this last part: showing people how to actually live as a Christian. I loved it. So, you can imagine how devastating it was to have that outlet ripped out from under me and to be thrown into a decidedly non-ministerial lifestyle that I did not choose.

Working at the Food Bank was excellent. I enjoyed my work and began to build relationships with my co-workers. I found purpose there, but it was still only adjacent to what I really wanted to do. So, I started looking into master’s degrees.

Last fall (2024), I started a program at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary with our diocese. I started taking one class at a time to see if I would like it, but it was a lot to work 40 hours a week, take one class, and still live the rest of my life. I loved my studies, but I really felt like I was just surviving, again. So, I quit my job at the Food Bank last spring (2025) and am going to pursue classes full time starting this fall. This means that I will be finished with my degree and the diocesan program in the spring of 2027. If all goes according to plan, I’ll finish with a Master’s in Theological Studies with a concentration in Spiritual Formation. I hope to use this degree to do what I’ve always done: build welcoming spaces for all and sundry to learn to life a full, vibrant Christian life.

Throughout the past couple of years, I’ve been in therapy regularly and working on some personal issues. I’ve been keeping myself healthy and learning to love my hobbies again. I’ve been playing with my daughter more and learning to love life, even if it doesn’t look like I thought that it would.

During the thick of working full time and taking classes, I needed the bandwidth to get my studies done and spend time with my family, so I stopped writing. But I’ve got things recalibrated now and I’m excited to begin writing again.

Thanks for being along for the wildest ride of my life, so far. I hope you’re blessed, encouraged, and empowered to live the life that God gave you. I’ve got some helpful things in store and I can’t wait to see where we go next.

Here’s to never loosing hope, even in the darkest night.